Jitsu wa Watashi wa Review
Warning: The following review may contain spoilers of the show Jitsu wa Watashi wa. If you wish not to know some plot details, or simply don't wish to find out what happens in the series, please exit the tab, and join me once you've watched the show. Or you know, you can continue to read, since you don't care about spoilers.
Anyways, with that said, thank you, and onto the review:
I think it's been a while since I've seen a harem show incorporate supernatural girls. And no, I'm not talking about Highschool DXD. I mean one that uses various girls with different supernatural backgrounds in one setting, much like Rosairo + Vampire. Tenchi Muyo does kind of count too, since most of the girls came from space.
I'm not exactly sure why I wanted to watch this series in the first place. Maybe I wanted another romantic comedy? A different harem show than the stereotypical ones out there? The first key visual? Or just because it looked like something I would like? Well, did I like it?
Actually, I did. During the first episode, I was hit with nostalgic feelings of both Rosairo + Vampire and Tenchi Muyo. Though those did fade a bit quickly, they still had an impact on why I liked this series. Besides being zany and wacky at times, the characters for the most part were good as well, besides a few minor traits and actual ones.
Besides the characters, we did get a few more problems, such as the middle not having as much punch, and the slight loss of appeal for me. There's also a few minor problems with some things that weren't my favorite. But overall, this was a very good series, and a nice break from the mostly cliche shows that are airing today.
Let's start off with the show's story, shall we?
Story
Asahi Kuromine has been known to fail at keeping secrets, mainly his own. Sometimes, they get easily figured out, and not for the better. This all changes when he starts to develop a crush on one of his classmates, Yoko Shiragami. When he tries to confess to her by going back to the classroom one late afternoon to drop off a love letter on her desk, he's in for a surprise. Yoko is actually a vampire!
Since Asahi has found out her secret, the only thing that Yoko can do is drop out of school if word gets out to her family. However, Asahi promises to keep her secret, possibly until his death, until they get out of high school. This proves quite difficult, considering that she's not the only girl who's part of the supernatural race at his school.
We have the studious girl who's actually an alien who uses an outer unit to store herself in, his childhood friend who may not be a werewolf or a vampire, but still has a god of fortune living in her fake glasses (she mostly just teases him), a werewolf who can shift between genders depending on seeing any depiction of our moon, and the principal of the school who's actually a 1,000 year old demon. Pretty soon, the secret looks like it's going to be hard to maintain, How's this going to end up?
Well, it isn't going to involve traveling into space or back in time. This is a romantic comedy, and it doesn't have to be that dramatic. As a whole, the story was pretty nice. I liked some of the conflicts that took place in the episodes, even if some were pretty bizarre (blame Akane for that). When the show has bursts of comedy, they are genuinely funny, even if some of the jokes do run a little dry through their runs. The last episode also had a pretty good conflict that got to be pretty intense at parts.
Of course, this show does falter a bit. It doesn't float into horribly murky waters, but it does become slightly boring in some aspects, where the comedy just isn't as funny, or I wasn't as interested in the episode that I was watching. The show does make a recovery in its final episodes, but could have used perhaps a little more?
But regardless of that, I still enjoyed myself when the good times came in. It may not be the strongest comedy show that I've seen, but I still laughed a lot during this show, and have a few great memories from, and I do kind of miss it (until the manga rolls around in January that is; I'm totally planning on reading it).
Let's go on and discuss the characters:
Though this show is a comedy series, that doesn't mean the characters are only traits, and not interesting. I have read several books and seen several shows with comedy as the central element where I get invested in some of the actions the characters take, or in the actual characters themselves. Minus a few, I still really liked the majority of the characters from this series. Again, like many others.
Let's start with Kuromine:
Okay, I'm going to put this out right away: don't expect Kuromine to be a very interesting character. If this was some bottom of the barrel stuff that lots of people (sometimes including me) complain about every new anime season, he would definitely get some eye rolls and groaning. However, I think Kuromine reminds me a bit of Tenchi from Tenci Muyo, expect a more easily frightened and panicked one (kind of like the OVA's, but without the powers and more exaggerated.)
Kuromine has always seemed to have the ability to not keep a secret for long at all. It isn't confirmed for how long this has been going on, but let's just say it's been a long time. The best example of this was his crush from last year named Nagisa, who rejected him when he was going to confess, because it was easily obvious he was in love with her. Since then, Kuromine has had no such luck in that department. But that all changes when he stumbles upon Yoko's secret. Pretty soon, he finds out deeply guarded secrets about his other classmates, and more chaos ensues (I just hope his friends have secrets of their own, they would benefit from that immensely). He is also projected to extreme nosebleeds when perverted situations happen to him, earning him the nickname Eromine, which is used on several occasions (but not too many).
Overall, I did like Kuromine in the end. Sure, he's a bit wimpy and a little too cliche, but I do like his courage for trying to protect Yoko's secret. At the end of the show, he even is willing to go so far as to remove his memories of Yoko entirely so that her secret can still be protected. He can have a strong will. If there was less of that whiny side, I'd really admire him. But he's good for what he is.
Yoko's turn:
Yoko is a dhampir, meaning that she is half human, half vampire. Born from a human mother and vampire father, she has various traits that distinguish her from normal humans, such as her fangs, and the way her skin tans fairly easily when exposed to too much sunlight. Besides that, she also does various other things in order to preserve her identity as a vampire, as walking to school at the crack of dawn, and eating lunch when everyone's out of the classroom after school.
Though she may appear to be very mysterious, Yoko is actually quite bubbly and energetic, a fault of this being the fact that she is extremely dense. She often ships Kuromine and Nagisa together, even though he mainly has a crush on her, though later down the road, she also starts developing feelings, but doesn't fully know how to act on them. Her main goal in life is to become the cool beauty type, though she has yet to achieve this goal.
As a whole, I found myself to grow on Yoko as the show went on. She has the right amount of energy that makes her a joy to watch, and she has this cheerfulness almost every single time she pops up, but it doesn't become annoying. It's great to see more characters like this who aren't too annoying for how bright and high-spirited they are, and Yoko is one of those examples.
Next, we have Nagisa:
Nagisa Aizawa is an alien from another planet, who uses a human body to store her actual form, which is actually a really short version of herself with an antenna on her head. Intentionally Asahi's crush, she turned him down because she was worried about her secret getting out. But when seeing Asahi and Yoko starting to talk more, she becomes increasingly curious, and her secret is also found out by Asahi, though her's doesn't have as harsh consequences, if any announced at all.
She is very militaristic, as this is the style of her species back home. As such, she approaches things with order. She, like Asahi's friends, knows that Asahi has feelings for Yoko, but that doesn't stop her from developing feelings of her own towards him. Towards the end of this series, this adds misunderstandings after an incident at a summer festival, where she trips, and Asahi catches her, leaving him with ice cream in his eyes, and both of them in an embrace. This also causes Yoko's confused feelings towards him.
Overall, I would say that Nagisa's okay. She's at least slightly better than Mikan (who I felt didn't really have a lot of presence in the show), but at the same time, I'm not crazy about her. She can be funny at times, and her personality does get better when she fell in love with Asahi, but as a whole, she's not the most interesting character in this anime. She reminds me of Tomoe from Absolute Duo, but a better one. At least Nagisa has personality compared to her.
Last up is my favorite character from this series, Shiho:
Because if there's one thing Shiho can do, it's nail an introduction.
Shiho is Yoko's childhood friend, and also a wolfman. If you're wondering about the wolfman part of the equation, here's something you don't hear every day. Shiho can actually switch genders if shown any picture of the moon, or if she views the actual planet. She first appears as Shiro, a white haired male with a tough personality and very sharp teeth, Shiho is a red haired female, and the form that appears pretty much all throughout the series besides Episode 6, and one commercial endcard. Then again, she's the dominant personality, so that explains why.
Besides being aware of everything that goes down in Shiro's body, Shiho is also an extreme pervert, who pretty much likes to put herself in sexual situations, grope other girl's breasts, look up skirts, and shamelessly flirt with Asahi for kicks. She also will support and anchor Yoko into confessing her feelings for Kuromine, because that's just what best friends do.
This girl is hilarious! Unlike other characters in comedies who have this kind of personality and fall a little flat, Shiho is like Ataru from D-Frag. Besides both being perverted and that being their main joke, they still show other traits, and at least all of their jokes are timed right, each completely funny. But Shiho stands out for me in this series because each scene she was in, I couldn't resist a little chuckle from coming out. She was that stage grabbing and present.
Other characters include Mikan, Asahi's childhood friend, the head of the Newspaper Club, and who has a god of fortune in her glasses. Her main hobbies including teasing the crap out of Asahi. Akane, the principal of the school who likes candy and trolling, and is also a demon, Akari, Asahi's homeroom teacher who is Akane's great-great-granddaughter, and will occasionally be the one who pulls the plug on Akari's pranks. Asahi's friends, who (besides Shimada), are pretty boring and don't really add anything to the anime besides just being token friend characters, and Yoko's parents.
Since Asahi has found out her secret, the only thing that Yoko can do is drop out of school if word gets out to her family. However, Asahi promises to keep her secret, possibly until his death, until they get out of high school. This proves quite difficult, considering that she's not the only girl who's part of the supernatural race at his school.
We have the studious girl who's actually an alien who uses an outer unit to store herself in, his childhood friend who may not be a werewolf or a vampire, but still has a god of fortune living in her fake glasses (she mostly just teases him), a werewolf who can shift between genders depending on seeing any depiction of our moon, and the principal of the school who's actually a 1,000 year old demon. Pretty soon, the secret looks like it's going to be hard to maintain, How's this going to end up?
Well, it isn't going to involve traveling into space or back in time. This is a romantic comedy, and it doesn't have to be that dramatic. As a whole, the story was pretty nice. I liked some of the conflicts that took place in the episodes, even if some were pretty bizarre (blame Akane for that). When the show has bursts of comedy, they are genuinely funny, even if some of the jokes do run a little dry through their runs. The last episode also had a pretty good conflict that got to be pretty intense at parts.
Of course, this show does falter a bit. It doesn't float into horribly murky waters, but it does become slightly boring in some aspects, where the comedy just isn't as funny, or I wasn't as interested in the episode that I was watching. The show does make a recovery in its final episodes, but could have used perhaps a little more?
But regardless of that, I still enjoyed myself when the good times came in. It may not be the strongest comedy show that I've seen, but I still laughed a lot during this show, and have a few great memories from, and I do kind of miss it (until the manga rolls around in January that is; I'm totally planning on reading it).
Let's go on and discuss the characters:
Characters
Though this show is a comedy series, that doesn't mean the characters are only traits, and not interesting. I have read several books and seen several shows with comedy as the central element where I get invested in some of the actions the characters take, or in the actual characters themselves. Minus a few, I still really liked the majority of the characters from this series. Again, like many others.
Let's start with Kuromine:
Okay, I'm going to put this out right away: don't expect Kuromine to be a very interesting character. If this was some bottom of the barrel stuff that lots of people (sometimes including me) complain about every new anime season, he would definitely get some eye rolls and groaning. However, I think Kuromine reminds me a bit of Tenchi from Tenci Muyo, expect a more easily frightened and panicked one (kind of like the OVA's, but without the powers and more exaggerated.)
Kuromine has always seemed to have the ability to not keep a secret for long at all. It isn't confirmed for how long this has been going on, but let's just say it's been a long time. The best example of this was his crush from last year named Nagisa, who rejected him when he was going to confess, because it was easily obvious he was in love with her. Since then, Kuromine has had no such luck in that department. But that all changes when he stumbles upon Yoko's secret. Pretty soon, he finds out deeply guarded secrets about his other classmates, and more chaos ensues (I just hope his friends have secrets of their own, they would benefit from that immensely). He is also projected to extreme nosebleeds when perverted situations happen to him, earning him the nickname Eromine, which is used on several occasions (but not too many).
Overall, I did like Kuromine in the end. Sure, he's a bit wimpy and a little too cliche, but I do like his courage for trying to protect Yoko's secret. At the end of the show, he even is willing to go so far as to remove his memories of Yoko entirely so that her secret can still be protected. He can have a strong will. If there was less of that whiny side, I'd really admire him. But he's good for what he is.
Yoko's turn:
Yoko is a dhampir, meaning that she is half human, half vampire. Born from a human mother and vampire father, she has various traits that distinguish her from normal humans, such as her fangs, and the way her skin tans fairly easily when exposed to too much sunlight. Besides that, she also does various other things in order to preserve her identity as a vampire, as walking to school at the crack of dawn, and eating lunch when everyone's out of the classroom after school.
Though she may appear to be very mysterious, Yoko is actually quite bubbly and energetic, a fault of this being the fact that she is extremely dense. She often ships Kuromine and Nagisa together, even though he mainly has a crush on her, though later down the road, she also starts developing feelings, but doesn't fully know how to act on them. Her main goal in life is to become the cool beauty type, though she has yet to achieve this goal.
As a whole, I found myself to grow on Yoko as the show went on. She has the right amount of energy that makes her a joy to watch, and she has this cheerfulness almost every single time she pops up, but it doesn't become annoying. It's great to see more characters like this who aren't too annoying for how bright and high-spirited they are, and Yoko is one of those examples.
Next, we have Nagisa:
Nagisa Aizawa is an alien from another planet, who uses a human body to store her actual form, which is actually a really short version of herself with an antenna on her head. Intentionally Asahi's crush, she turned him down because she was worried about her secret getting out. But when seeing Asahi and Yoko starting to talk more, she becomes increasingly curious, and her secret is also found out by Asahi, though her's doesn't have as harsh consequences, if any announced at all.
She is very militaristic, as this is the style of her species back home. As such, she approaches things with order. She, like Asahi's friends, knows that Asahi has feelings for Yoko, but that doesn't stop her from developing feelings of her own towards him. Towards the end of this series, this adds misunderstandings after an incident at a summer festival, where she trips, and Asahi catches her, leaving him with ice cream in his eyes, and both of them in an embrace. This also causes Yoko's confused feelings towards him.
Overall, I would say that Nagisa's okay. She's at least slightly better than Mikan (who I felt didn't really have a lot of presence in the show), but at the same time, I'm not crazy about her. She can be funny at times, and her personality does get better when she fell in love with Asahi, but as a whole, she's not the most interesting character in this anime. She reminds me of Tomoe from Absolute Duo, but a better one. At least Nagisa has personality compared to her.
Last up is my favorite character from this series, Shiho:
Because if there's one thing Shiho can do, it's nail an introduction.
Shiho is Yoko's childhood friend, and also a wolfman. If you're wondering about the wolfman part of the equation, here's something you don't hear every day. Shiho can actually switch genders if shown any picture of the moon, or if she views the actual planet. She first appears as Shiro, a white haired male with a tough personality and very sharp teeth, Shiho is a red haired female, and the form that appears pretty much all throughout the series besides Episode 6, and one commercial endcard. Then again, she's the dominant personality, so that explains why.
Besides being aware of everything that goes down in Shiro's body, Shiho is also an extreme pervert, who pretty much likes to put herself in sexual situations, grope other girl's breasts, look up skirts, and shamelessly flirt with Asahi for kicks. She also will support and anchor Yoko into confessing her feelings for Kuromine, because that's just what best friends do.
This girl is hilarious! Unlike other characters in comedies who have this kind of personality and fall a little flat, Shiho is like Ataru from D-Frag. Besides both being perverted and that being their main joke, they still show other traits, and at least all of their jokes are timed right, each completely funny. But Shiho stands out for me in this series because each scene she was in, I couldn't resist a little chuckle from coming out. She was that stage grabbing and present.
Other characters include Mikan, Asahi's childhood friend, the head of the Newspaper Club, and who has a god of fortune in her glasses. Her main hobbies including teasing the crap out of Asahi. Akane, the principal of the school who likes candy and trolling, and is also a demon, Akari, Asahi's homeroom teacher who is Akane's great-great-granddaughter, and will occasionally be the one who pulls the plug on Akari's pranks. Asahi's friends, who (besides Shimada), are pretty boring and don't really add anything to the anime besides just being token friend characters, and Yoko's parents.
Animation
The animation for this series was produced by TMS Entertainment, who are also known for their work on other series such as Kamisama Kiss, Bakugan Battle Brawlers, and Battle Girls: Time Paradox.
Overall, I thought the animation for this series was pretty nice. What I've seen of the manga's art hasn't been the most satisfying, but I think the staff did a good job working with it. The colors are very vibrant with everything on the screen, mainly hair. And overall, the animation has a unique style to it that I don't see in a lot of shows.
It's such a treat to see some interesting (the good kind) animation in anime, and I'm glad this provided that. It'd get really boring if all animes looked the same, right?
It's such a treat to see some interesting (the good kind) animation in anime, and I'm glad this provided that. It'd get really boring if all animes looked the same, right?
Sound
The scores for this series was composed by Akito Matsuda, most known for his work on D-Frag, Dogs & Scissors, and Sound! Euphonium.
Like I mentioned with D-Frag, the score for this series is very upbeat and cheerful. It also feels like it would be in a video game at various parts. There's a lot of nice, relaxed pieces, along with a couple that manage to be very dramatic. However, unlike how in D-Frag where some of the happier paces put me in a better mood, it didn't go that way this time because Jitsu wa Watashi wa's score pretty much sounds exactly like D-Frag's. I can get why, considering it's the same composer behind it, but the similarities are extremely apparent that it becomes hard to ignore.
But the best part out of the score goes to an insert piece sung by Minmi, called Holgram. This song is pretty awesome in the both versions it appears as, whether it'd be a more acoustic sound, or full-blown electronic. It varies depending on the situation in the show.
Now onto the voice work, which I expected to be mostly mediocre because some of the seiyuus I haven't really liked in other shows, and they also haven't had a lot of experience. I was surprised to see that it was actually quite good. None of the voices are too high for most of the girls that it becomes annoying, but most in Yoko's case. Her voice is the perfect balance of cute and high-pitched that it doesn't become annoying the more I listened to it, but I kept on growing to it. The only voices that I wasn't a big fan of were 2 of Asahi's friend (minus Hiro Shimono, who like always, gives a great performance), as Daisuke Hirakawa and Wataru Hatano sound too plain, which do work for their characters, but too much so.
Highlights in this show include Natsuki Hanae, Yu Serizawa, Inori Minase, Reina Ueda, Mao Ichimachi, Emi Nitta, Aya Uchida, Kenichi Miya, Hiro Shimono, Rikya Koyama, and Yoko Hikasa.
But the best part out of the score goes to an insert piece sung by Minmi, called Holgram. This song is pretty awesome in the both versions it appears as, whether it'd be a more acoustic sound, or full-blown electronic. It varies depending on the situation in the show.
Highlights in this show include Natsuki Hanae, Yu Serizawa, Inori Minase, Reina Ueda, Mao Ichimachi, Emi Nitta, Aya Uchida, Kenichi Miya, Hiro Shimono, Rikya Koyama, and Yoko Hikasa.
Verdict
This was a nice romantic comedy that I think should re-enter the balance of the light novel cliche brand shows and the more romantic comedy harem ones. This balance needs to be restored/built so that people don't have to sigh and bang their heads on their desks whenever something new gets announced that's in the cliche brand. Some more of these would be much appreciated.
Other than that though, I liked this show, even though the middle wasn't as strong as it should have been, and some of the characters weren't necessarily needed. I'd recommend this show for people would need to unwind after some intense shows, or if you need a nice harem anime that doesn't sound like every cliche will be in there.
Score: 8/10
Positives:
Good story.
Nice main characters.
Great animation.
Surprisingly good voice work.
The insert song Hologram.
Show uses dramatic moments that it has well.
Negatives:
Middle of show isn't as strong overall.
Some characters aren't really needed.
Akio Matsuda's score far too similar to D-Frag.
Other than that though, I liked this show, even though the middle wasn't as strong as it should have been, and some of the characters weren't necessarily needed. I'd recommend this show for people would need to unwind after some intense shows, or if you need a nice harem anime that doesn't sound like every cliche will be in there.
Score: 8/10
Positives:
Good story.
Nice main characters.
Great animation.
Surprisingly good voice work.
The insert song Hologram.
Show uses dramatic moments that it has well.
Negatives:
Middle of show isn't as strong overall.
Some characters aren't really needed.
Akio Matsuda's score far too similar to D-Frag.
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